The hosts should have better chances than most. Get a good group, with an auto top seed, why not us? Like a 10 percent chance would be pretty good, I'd say.
https://www.fourfourtwo.com/us/feat...r-value-mls-orlando-city-analysis-complicated 4.5-5 million still seems too low.
Canada's team in five years probably looks something like this: F: Cyle Larin, Borussia Moenchengladbach (Germany) Lucas Cavallini Penarol (Uruguay) Bench: Liam Millar, Toronto Kickz (CanPL) Anthony Jackson-Hamel, L'Impact Montreal; Tesho Akindele, FC Dallas MF: Scott Arfield, Burnley (England) Ballou Jean-Yves Tabla, AS Roma (Italy) Bryan Cristante, Atalanta (Italy) Tristan Jumeau, Burnley (England) Bench: Junior Hoilett, Glenn Gould United (CanPL); Diego Gutierrez, CD Palestino (Chile); Liam Fraser, Toronto FC; Will Johnson, Orlando City SC DF: Raheem Edwards, Toronto FC Ricardo Ferreira, Sporting Braga (Portugal) Nik Hagglund, Toronto FC Juan Cordova, Huachapito (Chile) Bench: Milovan Kapor, Zlate Morovce (Slovakia); Manjrekar James, Vasas (Hungary); Kwame Awuah, NYCFC GK: Milan Borjan (Korona Kielce, Poland) Bench: Sebastian Breza, Palermo (Italy), Callum Irving, Winnipeg Polar Bears (CanPL) I tried to create a reasonable roster. There are only 4 guys who haven't played at senior level. Breza has been on the bench, at 19, in the Serie A. Of their big 3 MLS prospects, I sent one to a CL team (Tabla), 1 to a team identified as pursuing him (Larin), and doomed 1 to obscurity (Alphonso Davies). I have them securing Ferreira and Cristante, which I think is likely. Given their desperation at CB, I figure they will recruit Hagglund, or try to snag Hedges or Opare. Germany: USA:: Chile: Canada. The brother of Gutierrez is also eligible. He started at left back for Colo Colo at 18.
Hedges will be wrapped up shortly for the US. Maybe at the Gold Cup this summer. I look at your roster there and see a huge amount of question marks and assumptions. Which is fine. That's the whole point of the fun exercise. When the Canadian U20 and U17 national teams play as poorly in the CONCACAF championships as they did this spring......................that's a bad sign for the future. The only team the U20s beat was Antigua & Barbuda, and the only team the U17s beat was Suriname. If we project Mexico, US, Central American, etc. rosters five years from now...............I don't think that Canada roster looks very promising. The way I see it the thread title is way off. There's nothing wrong with Canada. Based on their investment, player pool, federation, etc....................they're exactly where they should be. They need a drastic culture change. Maybe hosting a World Cup can be the impetus for that.
I'll agree there are certain assumptions. But I don't think it is overly sunny-sided. If I were going for the best-case scenario, I could easily add Davies, Akinola, Tomori, Kadioglu, Cristian Gutierrez, and put Millar on Liverpool's first team. For starters. The biggest thing for them, I think, is getting/keeping the four dual nationals in the fold. Cavallini posted a photo with Zambrano recently. So that looks good. I figure the closing window with Portugal and the draw of playing the WC at home will snag Ferreira. Cristante has played well lately, but there are still many guys in his path to the Azzurri. Tabla is still a mystery but looks better than a few months ago. The youth teams haven't succeeded. Certainly that's not good. But they haven't been fully stocked, either. Plus, they ignore Sigma, which produces all sorts of quality players.
My depressing comment is even if they get all of the players you suggest, they're still not as good as the US, Mexico, and the Central American powers. Costa Rica, right now, has players on Real Madrid, Espanyol, Deportivo la Caruna, Celtic, Palermo..............the list goes on. They're only going to advance from there. The US had 9 players get minutes in the Bundesliga this year alone (and that number is going to grow). Canada is improving, but they're not improving at a fast enough pace. And that's because the rest of the region is improving as well. Its a moving target. They need something to accelerate the pace. Once they're an actual contender to go to major tournaments and win events (as opposed to winning one Gold Cup match in a decade), then maybe they can recruit more dual-nationals. Right now they've been unable to even retain Teal Bunbury, and had to convince Tesho after accepted a US callup. These are MLS squad rotation-level players. Why on earth would Kadioglu switch to Canada? I don't get it. Why would Akinola, who starts for the US U17s, switch to Canada? I don't get it. What would possibly be the incentive?
Big 4 league players on the theoretical future Canadian roster: 6 Big 4 league players on the combined current rosters of Panama, Honduras, and Trinidad/Tobago: 0.
So, Clint, I see your point. And past performance is not something to be taken lightly. But if I were Canadian, I'd be pretty hopeful about where things are headed. They should be able to make something of the talent they have available. But you could have said that about a decade ago, too.
Why are you comparing the theoretical future of one program to the present of others? Seems comparing current youth results might be better when gauging the future. As is, in the U17's Canada finished behind Costa Rica and Cuba and their U20's finished behind Mexico and Honduras.
Yeah, but the domestic leagues of Panama and Honduras are going to produce more players than three Canadian MLS academies (plus a few others). Its the depth of the pool that's the problem with Canada. I like quite a number of Canadian prospects. There just aren't enough of them. I'd also argue that Canadian MLS teams really need to be more proactive. How many Canadian players have 8 appearances or more so far this MLS season? That's ~2/3rds of the games played for most teams. According to transfermarkt the answer is only 9 [Larin, Bernier, Osorio, Johnson, Ricketts, Akindele, Edwards, Tabla, and Davies] So how many Costa Ricans have 8 or more appearances so far this MLS season? The answer is........................also 9 [Urena, Calvo, Guzman, Venegas, Wallace, Waston, Bolanos, Ortiz, and Roy Miller.] This is the problem for Canada. They don't even have many players in their own "so to speak" top domestic division. The Whitecaps right now have more Costa Rican regulars than Canadian regulars. Costa Rica, of course, has the own top domestic division as well for developing their players. Canada is not gonna catch the rest of CONCACAF this way. Yes, they're certainly capable of beating any CONCACAF opponent on any given day. Their footprint just needs to ratchet up BIG TIME.
Fair question. 1) Their depth sucks. 2) Their coaching sucks. 3) A slew of their best eligible teens (Davies, Akinola, Millar, Trumeau, Tabla, Breza, C. Gutierrez, the England U17 keeper, maybe Bassong at Lille) didn't play. And Canada doesn't have the depth to lose 3-4 of the best guys per age group and succeed. I barely added players from those youth teams. Zero from the U17s. I bet someone turns out good, but who knows who after that stinker. I went with three U20s - Gutierrez, who's getting playing time in the Chile Primera; Fraser, because he was their best player and vanney speaks highly of him; and my gut is Millar has at least a Lennon-Lletget trajectory. FTR: Millar played for the 20s but barely aged out of the 17s.
Agree mostly. The CSA doesn't protect their domestics hardly at all. The Caps Hate Canada is an occasional slogan among CMNT fans, depending on the fortune of Canadians at the club, which lately has been dismal. It's been a strange year for Canadians in MLS. The overall minutes for Canadians were down early in the season, and I suspect they still are. But they have two leading contenders for ROTY. And Jackson-Hamel has been on a tear. So mixed bag.
So two months ago, there's no way I would have put Cavallini on a Canada roster. Recently, Zambrano has been visiting players and stopped in Uruguay to see him. They had a photograph taken side by side, and Cavallini posted it to his Twitter. I'm guessing that means he's back or at least considering.
Matt Hedges receives his first WCQ callup for the USMNT. Probably will be on the Gold Cup roster as well. This door is all but closed for Canada.
well both Mexico and the US seem to be sending their B-teams. Could be a good chance for Canada to win the GC.
Mexico's gonna send a "B" team as their top players will be at the Confederations Cup. I'm not yet convinced that the Americans are gonna send a "B" team. We'll see. When we see it we'll probably think of it as an A- team. Canada is in a Gold Cup group with both Costa Rica and Honduras. Advancement from the group phase alone would be a big step forward for them. As the last decade in the Gold Cup has been a nightmare. I'm not sure the problem is so much Canada dropping like a rock, but other CONCACAF nations taking a step forward. I mean, Costa Rica is a soccer-mad country with a population larger than that of Uruguay and Croatia. Panama is a soccer-mad country with roughly the population of Ireland. The USMNT has had a really tough time with Panama lately. It was just a matter of time before these nations took a step forward. Jamaica has some exceptional players. A CB combination of Wes Morgan of Leicester and Michael Hector of Eintracht Frankfurt (on loan from Chelsea) is pretty damn good. Kemar Lawrence on one side and Alvas Powell on the other? With Andre Blake behind them in goal. Strong! Jamaica currently has 11 MLS regulars available to them (plus their Euro contingent) and they can't qualify for the Hex either. That's because in order to make the Hex these days you need more than that. And what you really need is to lift your FIFA ranking any way possible so that you can get a good draw in the Fourth Round (the one prior to the Hex). Canada's ranking is so low that they're in the pot with the Caribbean minnows. By definition they were going to be drawn with two good teams. They have GOT to get their ranking above T&T and Jamaica. The Gold Cup is actually a great place to do that as T&T isn't even there. If Canada can win against Costa Rica and/or Honduras at the Gold Cup, and perhaps even make a little noise in the knockout rounds...............that'll do the trick. Those will be huge points for them to pick up. [Folks mock FIFA rankings, but they do matter in this one regard. Draws for the Gold Cup and WCQing.] I don't think anybody can argue that Canada isn't advancing. However, so is everybody else. That's the problem. Folks say Canada is developing prospects, but of course so are Honduras and Costa Rica. You just don't know the names of the teens being developed in the Costa Rican or Honduran leagues. They're there...........................
Its true that maybe their sporting madness is split between soccer and baseball....................I probably mis-spoke on that one. Point being that Canada having MLS players (and a couple of really good ones at that) doesn't separate them from nations like Panama. Anibal Godoy, Armando Cooper, Roman Torres, Adolfo Machado, Amir Murillo, Miguel Camargo, etc. are good MLS level players. And they have a bunch of guys playing around the world in various leagues of similar quality.
You know, 10ish years ago, Canada could call out a team with: Tomas Radzinski Julian DeGuzman Paul Stalteri Rob Friend Atiba Hutchison Mike Klukowski Lars Hirschfeld Jim Brennan Mike Simpson Patrice Bernier Dwayne DeRosario Pat Onstad That's four guys who played in a big 4 league. Three guys who played for perennial CL teams from smaller countries. A pair of Championship starters. Three guys who have been impact MLS players, including MVP and goalkeeper of the year. They had a small fleet of MLS starters like Ante Jazic or Andre Haimault. 20-year-old Simeon Jackson eventually played in the Premier League. Their youth ranks included future defectors like Asmir Begovic, Jonathan De Guzman. Daniel Fernandes. That team nearly made the Gold Cup final. And then .... how did this team not make the Hex on either side of that?